By Walter Williams: Syndicated columnist Charges of racial, religious and ethnic profiling swirl in the wake of US Airways’ removal of six imams. According to police reports, the men made anti-American statements, were praying and chanting “Allah,” refused the pilot’s requests to disembark for additional screening and asked for seat-belt extensions for no obvious reason. […]

By Leonard Pitts: Syndicated columnist The rappers are mad at Oprah again. Just one rapper, actually: the gentleman who calls himself 50 Cent, but whose 1994 mug shot identifies him as prisoner No. 94R6378: Jackson, Curtis. Mr. Cent — “Fiddy” to the cognoscenti — was one of a trio of rappers (Ice Cube and Ludacris […]

By Leonard Pitts: Syndicated columnist The N-word has had few friends better than comedian Paul Mooney. Put aside that the word was long a staple of his act. Put aside the promotional pamphlet he once sent out that screamed the word in big, fat type. Consider instead what he told anyone who argued that blacks […]

By Karl Terry: Local columnist Black Friday. In recent years, it’s come to mean the Friday after Thanksgiving. But the name itself seems pretty negative to me. With a wife who spent a good deal of her professional career in a family retail business I know full well how important the Christmas season is to […]

Josie Lamb of Clovis is one of the first customers to enter Triangle Ace Home Center in Clovis at 7 a.m. Friday as store manager Ron Scorzafava, right, unlocks and opens the door. (CNJ Staff Photo: Andy DeLisle) By Tonya Fennell and Ashley Lee: Freedom Newspapers Blanche Bentley was up with the sun Friday morning […]

By Leonard Pitts: Syndicated columnist One day, maybe 20 years ago, I ran into Eddie Levert. Eddie, a charter member of the legendary O’Jays, is one of the greats, a singer of thunderous power. Back then, his son Gerald was just starting out as a professional singer but already, people were remarking how much he […]

By Walter Williams: Syndicated columnist Blacks and Hispanics, especially blacks, are the most politically loyal people in the nation. It’s often preached and taken as gospel that the only way black people can progress is through racial politics and government programs, but how true is that? Let’s look at it. In 1940, poverty among black […]

By Clyde Davis: Local Columnist Her voice carries with it the assurance that you, too, can be as grounded and centered as she is. Her voice carries with it the confidence that, since she is an ordinary, everyday person who has come to this level of awareness, you can achieve that same level. Her stage […]

By Ryn Gargulinski: Columnist Anyone who can read this should consider themselves lucky — they survived yet another Friday the 13th. Not that I’m superstitious, knock wood, but certain things, like a full moon or the stray black cat that’s been circling my yard, just make me a little wary. This certainly applies for Friday […]

CNJ Illustration: Cortney Graham By CNJ Staff Area residents who suffer from paraskavedekatriaphobia may want to stay inside today, avoiding ladders and black cats. Today is Friday the 13th, and that’s the technical name for fearing this day. Pairing Friday and 13 are considered bad luck in English- and Portuguese-speaking countries around the globe, according […]

By Leonard Pitts: Syndicated columnist Good morning, gentlemen. I don’t know your names yet, but I want to talk to you about the man you killed. I read about it in The Miami Herald. How Lemroy Lawrence walked out of his house in Miami Gardens about 9 p.m. Tuesday to get some papers from his […]

Jimenez Custom Harvest company harvests corn for silage in southern Curry County. CNJ staff photo: Andy DeLisle By Marlena Hartz: CNJ staff writer Fields of corn baked in the sun all summer, and late in the growing season, were pounded by rain. But local corn growers have reported good yields, despite less than desirable weather […]

By Leonard Pitts: Syndicated columnist “Can you show me the doll that looks bad?” The two baby dolls are identical except that one has pale skin, the other is dark. The little black girl, maybe 5 years old, has been holding up the pale doll, but in response to the question, she puts it down […]

By Leonard Pitts Jr.: Syndicated Columnist We begin with the obvious: Florida is an American state. Miami is an American city. And Sherdavia Jenkins, who died in Miami just over two weeks ago after being struck by random bullets, was an American child. So I would have thought it uncontroversial to observe, as I recently […]

By Grant McGee: Local Columnist We added some rabbits to the family after Easter. “I’m not eating any rabbit I’ve raised,” I told The Lady of the House. “These won’t be eating rabbits,” she said. “These are composting rabbits. Feed and vegetables go in one end and garden compost comes out the other.” When I […]

By Walter Williams: Syndicated Columnist Let’s look at the recent “Nation’s Report Card,” published annually by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics. Nationally, in reading, only 13 percent of black fourth graders, and 11 percent of black eighth graders, score as proficient. Twenty-nine percent achieve a score of “basic,” which is […]

By Mona Charen: Syndicated columnist A devil’s brew of cynicism on one side and demagoguery on the other seemed to guarantee renewal of the “temporary” features of the Voting Rights Act first passed in 1965. The demagogues are straightforward. The Rev. Bob Edgar, general secretary of the National Council of Churches USA, declared, “Voting rights […]

By Don McAlvy: CNJ Columnist Back in 1973 patrolman Gene Dawson of the Clovis Police Department stumbled into a lost-and-found item no one wanted to claim while cruising down an alley. “Tell them they can have the lumber if they don’t want it,” Dawson said. He found a black wooden coffin, the kind that Count […]

Janet Taylor-Birkey Summer fun is finally here, but along with swimming, camping and playing outdoor sports, safety must be the first line of concern in any fun activity. Those at Cannon and surrounding areas need to be particularly aware of black widows, spiders, scorpions, centipedes and fleas, said Master Sgt. Michael Elliot, a Survival, Evasion, […]

By Leonard Pitts: Syndicated columnist So now we know how Martin Lee Anderson died. We can forget the original autopsy report filed by Charles Siebert, a doctor so inept he wasn’t technically a doctor (he had allowed his license to lapse) when he issued the report. A doctor so inept he once described a person […]